


A Snippet of Time

by Milu_i



Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Five needs a hug, Five-centric, Gen, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-28
Updated: 2019-03-23
Packaged: 2019-11-07 05:55:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,413
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17954861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Milu_i/pseuds/Milu_i
Summary: “-Five?”Something touches his cheek and he flincheshard. His eyes finally fling open to stare into their faces, too close, too crowded, too worried. The hand on his cheek wanders upwards to his clammy forehead, causing the frown on Diego’s face to deepen. He heaves a breath, tries to, but it gets stuck as a gasp. “Something’s wrong.”_____Collection of one-shots and multi-chaptered fics revolving around our favorite time-travelling son.





	1. no limits

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Music Tip:**   
>  **Ellie Goulding - Winner**   
>  [Spotify](https://open.spotify.com/track/5KiRGR02nn1AMbIvtjjX6v?si=qaJ5jk7gQ3-Y63s1hyxhRQ)   
>  [Youtube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q8HvhqiheQo)

 

A Snippet of Time

 

**№ 1**

_no limits_

 

 

It’s somewhere between calling his rebellious siblings to order and clutching their hands that he remembers her words.

_You can’t keep this up, Five. We both know that even you have a limit._

And it is with a smug smile on his lips that he feels triumph swelling in his chest. Because it is working. He can sense it in the air around him, filled to the brim with an unearthly electricity only he can cling to with the mere thought of his mind. He sees it in the faces surrounding him, growing younger and younger to match his own complexion.

No limits.  
Not space.  
Not even time itself.

Invincible, he hears her voice calling in his mind with awe and wonder, before he pushes the ache away to never look at it again. It’s done, she’s gone, probably already destroyed in the fiery death –

Right. Focus.  
A deep breath. One last time he closes his eyes, ignores their wondrous stares, grasps for the fleeting strands slipping away over and over again, until he clutches them tightly and _pulls_.

 

It is like it is every other time.  
The strong smell of ozone fills his nose and nearly suffocates him, before there is an ear-deafening crack all around him and he finally arrives. His heart is pounding painfully hard in his chest which heaves under heavy breaths, while the headache nearly splits open his skull. The usual.

“It- holy shit it actually worked!”  
A voice somewhere to his left. It takes a second too long to match it to Klaus. Another one arises, filled with the same wonder and excitement, but he can’t make out their words. Slurred. Incomprehensible. Why are they-

“-Five?”  
Something touches his cheek and he flinches _hard_. His eyes finally fling open to stare into their faces, too close, too crowded, too worried. The hand on his cheek wanders upwards to his clammy forehead, causing the frown on Diego’s face to deepen. He heaves a breath, tries to, but it gets stuck as a gasp. “Something’s wrong.”  
The mumbled words barely reach his ears, while his own hand fumbles on his collar. It’s too stuffy in here, too hot. He needs to- “Breathe with me, kid, come on,” Number Two calmly orders despite them being the same age now at least in body if not in mind, and slowly, oh so slowly, he follows the exaggerated breaths of his brother.

“There you go, that’s it,” he reassures him once more and keeps breathing ridiculously emphasized, but it helps. The tightness in his chest eases up with every shuddering gasp he takes. It helps, not with the trembling in his hands though. Quite the contrary. The more he tries to calm his racing heart, the shakier his hands get, until he throws bone-deep mannerisms to the winds and buries his fingers in the dark shirt of a grown up Diego kneeling in front of him. His heart stutters in open shock. What-

Their young faces are gone, instead his fluttering eyesight is being greeted by their adult forms once more, but none of them seems to be confused about it. “You- How in the world are you-“ the words barely want to leave his mouth and break off, high and unsteady, when the unmistakable sound of a large and heavy door opening arises somewhere to his left. A short glance around, quickly his eyes roam over the undamaged interior of the concert hall and the flawless ceiling, before he calls them to attention. The panic subsides, if not the shaking of his hands. Something to deal with later. As long as he has anything else to focus on, something to distract him from his destructive mind, he’ll be fine. They’ll all be fine.

“We need to go,” he orders and already grabs for those closest to him, still Diego and Allison, still firm concern edged into one face, so blaringly unfamiliar it makes him shudder, and an unsettling muteness clinging to the other. “Come one,” he furiously calls, but they don’t make a move. Instead, of all places, they decide that making a stand _now_ is the right way to go. “No way, hold on a second, you were just on the brink of-“

“I’m fine,” he cuts Luther off with a glare that should turn him to ashes on the spot, but nothing of the sort happens. “He’s right,” Diego mutters to his left and forces more than one disbelieving face in his direction, but he doesn’t seem to care. His eyes are still solely focused on Five, who really doesn’t “-have time for this bullshit!”

“You need to calm down first, then we’ll figure out a plan-“  
He doesn’t give Diego enough time to finish. Fuck it, if they want to be stubborn, he will be too. Closing his eyes and reaching forward again, he ignores the hard stab in between his eyes and makes a grasp for them. If he can transport seven people (six and a ghost to be exact) back into the past, porting them from one place to another in the same city, even without the extended help of physical contact, shouldn’t be a problem.

And of course it isn’t.  
He can feel their surroundings shift and bend, one second he sees rows of seats covered in red silk, the next he feels cold, hard stone under his covered feet. An echo in his ear, footsteps, distant. The dim, far away sound of the street that lingers just outside of their house.  
He opens his eyes and returns their expectant stares, wide eyed, all prepped in a stance to rush forward should he crumble. “I’m fine, “ he mumbles, and he is, actually. The headache is gone, his hands merely feel numb, strangely distant, as if he isn’t really connected to his body yet. He takes a deep, steadying breath. Then another.

“Really,” Diego mutters disbelievingly, still with eyes lingering on Five like a hawk. For once he doesn’t argue back, instead tries to collect himself enough to force out a witty reply or a sly remark, anything to reassure himself – and them - that he’s alright.

“What was that then?”

“Too much,” he quietly replies to Luther’s skeptical question, as he tears his hands away from where he still is holding onto them to throw a cautious look around. They are in the manor. But when?

“Of what?”  
He contemplates not answering Klaus, while his eyes roam around nearby side tables for a newspaper. Nothing. Heaving another breath, which is harder to take in than the others, he finally replies, “Jumping. Time, space.” His voice cracks, his breath is short. Still alright, he tells himself and takes a step away from them, when they edge closer. He needs some room, they’ve been too close for way too long now.

_You can’t keep this up, Five. We both know that even you have a limit._

Maybe she has been right, to some level at least.  
There are only so many jumps through space he can make, before his body shuts down.  
But when has he ever been someone to not try and bust through given limitations with a figurative battering ram?  
He clears his throat when it feels husky to make another attempt at explaining, cause his siblings seem anything but reassured. Since when are they doing this? Or are those some leftover remnants from realizing that they’ve all abandoned their lone sister to her cruel, lonesome fate? A desperate try to make up for years of egoistic decisions? Of giving a fuck about their lost brother returning from oblivion to save them all, since there apparently are more important matters to attend?

“There is a limit to doing what I do.” Heaving another breath, he turns around once more. A calendar of sorts? Did dad ever have those hanging around randomly? “You can imagine that bringing your sorry asses-“

And then the pain starts to set in, cutting him off.  
His breath stutters once more, then halts, when a piercing stab of pain not only shoots through his head, but through his whole body instead. With the first wince comes the first painful moan, escaping his tight lips and erasing any movement around him. For a short moment he feels relief – then the pain returns.

“-ve, can you hear me?”

“We need to get… -lp, get her-“  
They start to fade away, the pain overwhelming. Another moan, repressed, stuck in his throat, but still audible for the world to listen to his suffering. Then…

“What is going on here?”  
A sharp voice, slicing through the fog in his brain, forces his slipping eyes back towards the stairs. Distantly he feels two pairs of hands (too many, too soon; _stop_ ) on his arms steadying his wavering form. It’s too much.

And when his father’s eyes land on him, when they widen in unfamiliar surprise, when more steps echo from the stairs and bring more people, more faces, he finally gives in.  
Someone laughing to themselves, distant, quietly.  
Surprised shouts fade away as he sinks to the ground and dissolves into sweet, peaceful oblivion.

_You can’t keep this up, Five.  
We both know that even you have a limit._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So.  
> I'm really, really forcing myself to turn this first idea not into a too long fic I'm not able to finish anyway, so it'll be a os for now. Probably gonna add another part to it later on, but it'll be marked properly in the title. There are too many snippets I left here and there throughout the chapter that I'd love to address and which I hope you noticed.  
> If you have any wishes or ideas for os' around Five let me know and if inspiration hits me, I'll include them.  
> Usually I write longer stuff now, somewhere around 4k - 8k, but I'm (once again) trying to get back into writing. Since work is a mess atm and making it hard to focus on anything else than stressing myself out, I'll stick to the shorter os' for the moment.
> 
> Milu


	2. be true

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Five.”  
> He stiffens. Eyes wide, focused on the cursed briefcase resting innocently on the table in front of him. Oh. A strangled sound behind of him, higher, younger. Oh no.
> 
> “Dad.”  
> It barely crosses his lips, the shock rooting him to the place pressed against the table.
> 
> For the first time ever since he left hell itself, he doesn’t know what to do.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Music Tip:**   
>  **Twenty One Pilots - Cancer**   
>  [Spotify](https://open.spotify.com/track/19W5OTEcQI3ZoRW1HERMyy?si=YTFEW7PQTpSqyyFGit9fBg)   
>  [Youtube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yw6i1SAHetc)

A Snippet of Time

 

**№ 2  
** _be true_

 

 

He’s gone and done it all.

Survived in a world filled to the brink with death.  
Ran out of time while jumping through the very same.  
Being a savior with his hands bathed in cold blood.

Despite it all he still trembles all over, when he physically feels the time running through his fingers like sand, unable to stop it, unable to even slow it down. If he messes this up –  
With a curse muttered under his breath he counts the seconds until they’ll find him, before he successfully adjusts the time on the briefcase and leaves the house with a bang. Quite literally. He isn’t fast enough though to escape the blast, too slow to get away unscathed, so he raises the case in a desperate but nonetheless stupid attempt to shield himself. At the same time he reaches out, too slow to activate the time-travelling-device manually, and gives the stored power a push with his own.

One blink of an eye later the ear-deafening noise of the explosion, the screams and the roaring fire lunging for him disappear into nothingness. In the next he is catapulted onto a hard, wooden table filled with several bottles and glasses shattering upon his unexpected impact. The air is punched out of his chest when he lands on top of the briefcase. For several, very long moments he just… stills. It takes his brain longer than expected to catch up with him, but when there is a certain lack of gunshots, screams and that silky, horrible voice, his tense muscles slowly begin to unwind. He made it. He is back.  
Not with his own power – if he has a choice he will never, ever time travel again on his own accord. But the briefcase seems to do its job right enough, he has to admit. Now…

It’s harder than expected to climb off the case and the table, his struggle more of a stumble and hopeless attempt to not fall to the floor face first, when his legs refuse to carry him. His arms clutch the edge of the table, surprise written all over his face for the second he allows the emotion to push through, before it is being shoved away like the rest of it all. Explosion must have shaken up his thrice-damned body of a child more than expected. Nothing a cold glass of whiskey won’t fix, though.

“Impossible.”  
Unable to suppress the flinch upon the unexpected voice of Pogo sounding from somewhere behind of him, he wills his hand to steady and reach forward again in its clutch for the crystal bottle filled with the familiar, golden shimmering liquid.  
Anger bubbles up as he fills a glass for the moment of weakness he has let simmer through. Unwilling to ban it out of his voice for the butler, he replies curtly, “As impossible as the first time I showed up to save your sorry asses?”

The whiskey burns on the way down his throat and only when he has emptied the glass in one go does he put it back down on the counter more forcefully than intended. “Where are the others? We have things to do, in particular a world to s-“

“Five.”  
Not a question but a simple statement.

What’s entirely unexpected though is the owner of said voice, one he’ll never forget despite the fact that he hasn’t heard it in over fifty years. He stiffens. Eyes wide, focused on the cursed briefcase resting innocently on the table in front of him. Oh. A strangled sound behind of him, higher, younger. Oh no.

He turns around, one hand still clutching the wooden counter to keep himself upright.  
His eyes settle first on the table in the middle of the room. Several sets of dishes, breakfast is about to be served. Seven sets – not eight. Later, then. A few years, if the look of his shocked siblings is anything to go by. And despite the fear and exasperation clutching his heart in a tight grip, his mind rolls on and on and on. Probably around sixteen, seventeen? They are all still there, so not eighteen yet. That means – Right. Ben is there. In the flesh. Whole, alive, and a sort of concern edged into the traits of his face he hasn’t seen in forever. Maybe even never, if he is being honest to himself.  
And in front of them…

“Dad.”  
It barely crosses his lips, the shock rooting him to the place pressed against the table.

For the first time ever since he left hell itself, he doesn’t know what to do.  
Fleeing seems useless. They’ve seen him, they know he is alive. He already changed too much with his mere presence.  
Back to the future then? The right one this time? Or will it already be altered by now?

With half a mind he wants to turn around and fumble on the locks of the briefcase.  
With the other he realizes that even if he were to return, they would all remember this. A brief moment of time in which their lost brother returned, only to run off again at the mere sight of them, without word nor explanation.  
His feet turn cold and something tasting suspiciously like acid bubbles up in the back of his throat. But to begin anew? Every explanation, every desperate try to get them to believe? And now they’ll be so much more vulnerable than before, none of them even remotely close to their future abilities, not to speak of the figurative elephant in the room, his dad himself –

“Where were you?”  
It’s one of the boys that speaks up first, despite their iron rule of no talking during breakfast. Their dad, instead of reprimanding Diego, takes a step forward. Five takes one back and away from him, pressing himself closer to the table at his back. Dad stops. The motion is lost on no one.

“ _When_ were you?” he finally asks with that unforgiving voice of his that turns his stomach and the color of his face into an ugly, pale shade.  
It feels like being back. Mentally. Suddenly there is nothing of his fifty-something years old snarky comments, smart and unnoticeable in directing the conversation in the way he wants to. There is nothing of his hard-headed bravery that pushed him through fields of corpses to reach the haven on the other end and which kept him from crumbling whenever another attempt to get back failed.

Instead he feels like a thirteen-year-old boy for the first time in forever.  
Scared, exhausted to the bones and starved for what he won’t get anyway. Not in this household. Not anywhere, really.

He heaves a breath, shaky and unsteady.  
Like his hands, trembling where they bury themselves into the wooden table with an iron grip.  
Like his legs, unable to carry him any longer. He needs to get away, preferably into his bed. But they won’t let him go without something akin to an explanation.

“The future,” he begins, but his voice breaks. He wants to take another breath, throw them half the truth so they won’t bother him, but instead he freezes once more when one of his siblings, tall and blonde, breaks away from their assembled front to take long and steady steps towards him. He can’t deal with this now, not when he is raw and on edge and not mentally prepared for any form of physical closeness.  
Before Luther is even far enough to pass their father though, the very same puts out an arm to stop him without taking his eyes away from Five even once. It’s so unsettling and relieving all at once, that the breath stuck in his throat escapes him in a shaky whiff. Too close to the sob trying to break free ever since he landed back in the past. Too close to showing them too much. Quickly he keeps talking.

“I- I was –“  
Or at least tries to. It’s a first that he evades his eyes, unable to stand the piercing stare of his father whenever he so much as glances in their general direction. What the hell is going on with him? Rage bubbles up in his chest, directed at himself solely, while he presses his fingers painfully into the unyielding wood.  
It shouldn’t be so hard to face him – them, really – after all this time. And still he keeps slipping. His words just as his mind.

“Alone.”  
It escapes before he can reel it in. And with one single word everything else becomes undone.  
It helps that they are absolutely quiet. Not even mom makes a noise from where she silently stands by Pogo’s side. It helps him pretend that he is back there, alone with only Delores to judge him in her everlasting silence.

“I jumped and it worked perfectly fine and then I suddenly – Everything was destroyed. All of it. I couldn’t find y- I couldn’t find _anyone_.” I doesn’t make sense probably, not even close to it, but the jumbled up words fleeing his mind and mouth are impossible to stop. So for once he gives in, lets the tears collect in his bright eyes and looks back up. They have turned to stone. Their faces caught in a mix between shock and disbelieve. Even dad’s seems a little bit more human. Something dark, unfamiliar hides behind his monocle, something he only ever has seen from Vanya. Or Ben. Or Diego and Klaus, recently.

Protective, a voice in his mind whispers, sounding suspiciously like Delores.

“Until I found you.”  
The twisted smile is back on his face, completely void of humor. It gives him the confidence to throw it all out there.

“All of you, together at last. Killed by whatever eliminated life on Earth as we know it.”  
And there it is again, that sliver of hope which gives him a grasp on whatever composure he has left. Focus. He can turn this around. Throw them into the water now, so they can focus on what is important. They have so much time left, it’ll be easy to figure it out now with years before it happens-

“What happened to you?”  
Another one of his siblings. Ben. It’s weird to hear his voice again for the first time in forever, but he successfully represses the flinch. Now is not the time for that. Not at all.  
Instead he pulls strength from his recurring focus like he has done whenever dark shadows threatened to overwhelm him the first time around, back in the past-now-future-like state of time. “The future happened,” he snaps and finally loosens his grip. The wave of vertigo hitting him like a brick in the face doesn’t stop him in the slightest. “A future that equals the end of everything as we know it and I’m back to stop it. But I can’t do it with close-minded notions and completely selfish behavior. You people need to get your shit together, all of you.”  
It’s a particular hard stare he levels at their father and he doesn’t doubt for a second that they’ll have a long and headache-inducing talk after this, but at least it gets the point across.

For another second there is complete silence, then Ben pipes up once more not in a way he expects. “That’s not what I meant.”  
Instead of staying in the background, quiet and observing like Five remembers, something akin to resolve settles on his face, as he makes his way around the table towards his position, evading their father in the process. When Five tenses up involuntarily, he stops.  
“What happened to _you_?”

And it’s only then that he chances a glance downwards.  
His clothes are littered with dust from the explosions. There are tears in the fabric from when he wasn’t fast enough. Scrapes all over his hands, bloody and bruised. He is favoring his left leg in an obvious stance.

“None of your concern,” he mumbles absentmindedly. Telling them about the Commission at all will be a bad idea. As long as they don’t follow him again – and with what he just did to them he supposes it will be some time at least – it won’t be a problem.  
And when push comes to shove he will deal with it appropriately. Like he did last time. Like he did every other time.

It is when he finally lets go of the table to stumble out of the room towards his own with a sly remark and a “We’ll talk about it later”, that he notices it. A sharp pain shooting through his gut and the right side of his body. He can’t even pass the bar, before his right leg gives out. On his way down, always one for fast reactions, he throws his arm out in a hopeless attempt to keep himself upright, but instead pulls down several glasses and bottles that shatter on the ground and with them the silence.

Multiple voices mix into one, as he crashes to the ground. The pain explodes and devours his senses, until his feeling returns in the form of hands on his shoulder turning him around and the stabbing ache spreading like fire. A hand taps on his cheek firmly, until he forces himself to open his eyes.  
For a moment he feels like he is back.

A reddish glow illuminates the air around him.  
Flickering tongues of fire lapping at his skin, burning it up until he melts away, turning to ash like the lump blocking his throat –

“Five!”  
Her voice pulls him back. Vanya. She is kneeling beside of him, opposite of their father, both illuminated by the sun rising above the neighboring houses and shining onto his pale face. It all feels slower somehow, her words don’t reach him properly even though she keeps talking on and on. His father’s face is turned into another direction, hands occupied by pressing down on his stomach. It hurts.

“-the room, bring a gurney. He’s bleeding out as we-“

“…hurts.”  
His voice is too quiet. Nonetheless Reginald stops for a moment to spare a glance down at him. Calculating, probably. His mouth turns into a half-smile. Would be funnier, if it wouldn’t remind him so much of himself. Maybe they were right after all. He is too damn similar to the old bastard.  
It is when his father continues to speak to Grace while Pogo rushes off, that he takes a glance down. The hands pressing down on him, old and lined, are bathed in a bright red. Hmm. Did she get him after all?

“Who got you? Whom are you talking about?!”  
Another voice pops up beside Vanya. He can’t quiet make them out. Diego? Luther?

“Eyes open, Number Five,” their father calls him to attention and taps him on the cheek once more. It only comes slowly to him, that he didn’t even notice he closed his eyes once more. Something in that realization sticks with him for the long moments his father catches his gaze and doesn’t let go for once.  
He’s dying, isn’t he? The tingling feeling in his limbs, the darkness at the edge of his vision paired with the exhaustion trying to pull him under…

“Hurry up, Goddammit!”  
It’s the first time he sees his father like this. Weird. Maybe it is a dream after all? A hallucination?

His eyes are on Five again, staring and staring and staring, while his hands press down even harder. It doesn’t hurt anymore.  
A thought, out of the blue, that suddenly sets his blood on fire and burns away the lethargy. He tries to grab for his father’s hand with shaking fingers. Something crumbled and smeared with blood is pressed into his stubborn clutch. “Harold Jenkins.”

The only reaction he gets is a glance out of the corner of his eyes, while he studies the wound. The frown tightening on his forehead as well as his eyes still lingering on him are enough to keep him going. Even though every breath is impossible to take into his shuddering lungs. Even though the darkness flares up like a wildfire all around him. He can’t even make out Vanya anymore.  
“You- if I- you need to… Kill him. Harold Jenkins,” he presses out with obvious pain lingering in his voice, but he can’t let go yet. Not until the job is done.

“What are you talking about?”  
Calm. It takes the frightening edge off of his panic.

“Promise me. He- he’s…”  
Words are too hard to form. He does seem to understand anyway.

And with a tight nod and a bloody hand pushing the strands out of his clammy face, he closes his eyes to his dad’s quiet words.  
“Alright, then.”

And lets go.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> YOU GUYS! Are simply amazing. My God.  
> Thank you. Each and every single one of you who commented, kudoed (is that a thing?) or read this little piece? Thank you. <3
> 
> This one was supposed to come out earlier, but everything is kinda shit atm. :D  
> My vacation was cancelled because we don't have enough ppl at work, meanwhile I'm sick and still working cause why not and we got broken in (work) so... it's peachy. xD
> 
> Writing this os was helping a lot though, kept my mind off of things for a while. And it's longer this time, a length I feel slightly more comfortable with. Let me know what you think and whether you have any certain requests!
> 
> Love, Milu


	3. no limits II

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It’s… beautiful.  
> No ash and smoke clouding the sky as far as his eyes can see, no blood red sunset from the fires devouring earth, no heavy rainclouds covering up the blue vastness and all of his mistakes, as he tries to change it all and fails anyway.  
> A smile edges its way onto his lips. A quiet “Huh”. Contemplating.
> 
> There is no ache. At all.  
> No headache and painful tension in his muscles.  
> No lingering stab of pain where the wound in his abdomen should have been.  
> No lingering tremble in his hand.
> 
> So, after all… he died.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Music Tip:**   
>  **Drew & Ellie Holcomb – Fields of Gold**   
>  [Spotify](https://open.spotify.com/track/1q7QOfniMB1Dy7RMqDNlCO?si=aKvQHbVXS_CixuGpyRUBNQ)   
>  [Youtube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBTfvEjmp4c)

A Snippet of Time

 

 **№ 3  
** _no limits II_

 

  
He wakes quietly.  
No sudden noise that rips him out of his sleep and pushes him to high alert.  
No nightmare that leaves him shaking and gasping for breath.

Instead he slowly comes to, awareness creeping up until he consciously heaves a deep breath and relaxes into the comfortable sheets beneath him. His body melts into the warmth surrounding him and he dozes off once more. Just a few more minutes, he tells his lulling mind.  
When he finally opens his eyes - minutes, hours later maybe – they fall on the rays of sunshine bathing him in a golden glow. He blinks a few times, until the light is not as harsh. Still, he can’t take his eyes away. It’s… beautiful.

Beautiful in a different way from what he is used to.  
No ash and smoke clouding the sky as far as his eyes can see, no blood red sunset from the fires devouring earth, no heavy rainclouds covering up the blue vastness and all of his mistakes, as he tries to change it all and fails anyway.  
A smile edges its way onto his lips. A quiet “Huh”. Contemplating.

He didn’t, did he?  
His memories are as clear as the day he returned to the past the first time around. There is no lingering confusion robbing him of the past events, no past-waking-up-moment in which he is oblivious. It doesn’t matter though. Never again.

Because…  
because.

There is no ache. At all.  
No headache and painful tension in his muscles.  
No lingering stab of pain where the wound in his abdomen should have been.  
No lingering tremble in his hand.

So, after all… he died.  
Another huff of air. The smile returns to his lips, while he clings onto his last memory. They have safely returned, that much he recalls. In their adult forms no less, even if there was a bout of confusion mixed in there. It’ll help them dealing with dad. Explaining it all. Making sure it never happens again. Would have been harder in their younger bodies, so… They’ll be fine.

And somehow, this one time, it isn’t so hard to believe.

Closing his eyes he tries to relax once more into the soft sheets. The smell haunts him, familiar but oh so far away in his mind. Just like when he was but a child, once upon a time when Grace changed the sheets with that same, flowery smell and he thought nothing of it.  
Until sleeping in a bed became a luxury. Until smelling anything else than decay and smoke was like a desperate gasp of air while breaching the water surface of a vast, dead ocean. Next time he sees her he has to th-

Right.  
Robot. Not likely to see her in the afterlife.

He ignores the short stab in his heart upon that thought and buries his face further into his large pillow. No negative thoughts yet. He wants to cling to this contentment in his chest for just a little while longer, so unfamiliar and new. Another deep breath filling his lungs and pushing him further into sweet oblivion of sleep.

He can do that now. Right?  
Dreamless nights. Rest for what it’s worth it – not half-awake minutes stolen under the glistening sun burning his skin while he walks further and further trying to escape it all. He can sleep for however long he wants to. No obligations, no worlds to safe, no people to kill.  
The thought makes him stumble and ultimately pulls him out of the now distant lull.

Why is he here?  
The afterlife, heaven, whatever you want to call it. After everything he has done, the people he has killed, innocent and guilty alike, he should not be here. Not by a long shot. And still… It is peaceful. Quiet.  
It is what calms his fragile mind down at last. The turmoil has subsided, the waves ebbed away. Something he hasn’t felt in an eternity. Maybe not even before his unfortunate jump through time. He was always on edge, always on the brink of grasping for something unknown inside of him, something else than the slumbering power of manipulating time. Now it is… it is good. Fine.  
The panic is gone. The uncertainty lost. He knows they are safe, feels it in his bones.

He closes his eyes once more, trying to bring himself back into that blurred state of mind, but the moment is gone. The more his awareness grows, the more the pillow feels _too_ soft, nearly choking. The sun is _too_ hot, burning his skin like it did back then. His throat is parched, his legs shaking when he pushes himself into an upright position to stand up. Lingering effects from his death still? He _had_ been in a lot of pain.

It’s alright. It’s fine.  
He’ll deal with it like with everything else. If this really is the afterlife, it’ll be a walk in the park compared to what he endured before in his desperate attempts to just keep them safe.

His body needs a moment to stay upright, legs more than unsteady still, but he manages in the end. Slow steps lead him into the cool shadow of the hallway, where he heaves a deep breath. Able to breathe a little easier without the stuffy air he pushes on, barefoot and clad in a long white button up shirt paired with dark pajama bottoms. Admittedly, it is a weird combination, but waking up in the afterlife in a suit is the last thing he wants to imagine right now. _That_ part of his life, including most of it really, is over now.  
Even though the thought is as terrifying as it is refreshing. Trying to simply be himself, with no gun or mission to lead him on his way. It would be a little bit easier, if he weren’t alone.

And as if God or Buddha or whatever deity chose to let his sorry excuse for a soul continue to exist has heard him, sudden voices grow louder the closer he comes to the kitchen of the manor.

“-can’t blame him for being skeptical. It is a little bit… unsettling.”

“Exactly. Thank you, dear sister of mine.”  
He stops, one foot hovering in the air above the last stair.  
No. Nononono _no_!

“Let’s just… no discussion will help us right now, until-“

“I think the more we prepare, the better. Go for all eventualities. It’s… He would, wouldn’t he?”

His heart stops in his throat, he is unable to call out or rush into the kitchen. Instead he leads his body on until he can make them all out, while he hides away in the dark shadows. Unseen, unnoticed.  
They are all there and it breaks his heart.

Arguing amongst themselves, but different as from what he remembers.  
It is… more civilized. While Allison sits at the table, her back towards him, he can still hear her talk. Loud and clear and without a strain in her voice. As if the wound never existed in the first place. Diego leans against the counter, unknowingly facing him with crossed arms, while he still looks relaxed in doing so. A small frown on his face shows his concentration, as he calmly listens to Luther without even once interrupting. Number One stands at the head of the table, slightly aside from Vanya who sits peacefully beside him and quietly studies Luther. Not an ounce of fear in her body. What is even more unsettling than all of that, what finally brings him certainty, is Ben’s completely solid form sitting beside Klaus, while Luther’s eyes and words are clearly aimed at their deceased brother.

They have died. All of them.

Before the chocked sob can escape his throat, before tears can leave his wide opened eyes, heavy footsteps make him fly around on the spot, dizziness be damned.

“I’ll have to admit, Number Five, I’m impressed. You truly did it.”  
He can’t for the life of him tell, why his father’s voice doesn’t sound as disappointed as he feels.

“I’m- I’m so sorry,” he whispers shakily, but the time for being embarrassed or closed off is over and done with. ~~He~~ \- They have to know everything anyway by now. There is nothing to hide from his family here.  
Instead of heaving a deep, disappointed sigh, instead of blaming him for killing humanity’s only hope (once more?), Dad stays calm and quiet, before… “What for?”

“I didn’t mean to bring them here. I- I just wanted…” The worst part is that he is feeling guilty about it. He shouldn’t, but he raised them above all others, something his father always taught him _so_ differently.  
“You evaded the apocalypse. Your siblings told me.”

Clearly, they misinformed him. Dread settles in his stomach.  
“We didn’t,” he whispers nearly inaudibly, while the background noise of his siblings’ discussion rings in his mind like a calming wave. It doesn’t help much. “We just… fled. Like cowards.”

A deep sigh. Ahh, there it is.  
The disappointment.

“I knew this would happen. The moment in which you grew into an insolent genius I realized that the temporal side of your abilities would one day-“

“Mess with my head,” he concludes bitterly and earns a scolding glance form his father for interrupting him. Nonetheless he agrees. Of course he does, they are his own words, uttered once eons ago and still so far away. “It did.”

A moment of silence, a bout of laughter from the kitchen.  
It is a wonder they haven’t been noticed yet. Or it is a nice side-effect of being dead.

“In all your tendency to boast about your superiority and intellectual competence, you miss the point. Like you apparently did twice now in not listening properly to me. You fled, yes, and saved the world in the process.”

He-  
What?

“But- I didn’t,” he weakly argues, because he jumped back in time, too much for the body his soul was forced into, and died. Like the rest of them, otherwise they wouldn’t be here. End of the story.

“Not yet, maybe,” his father replies steadily while raising his chin in obvious defiance. “But you will. All of you. That’s why you came here in the first place, didn’t you? Don’t stop half way, show true endurance and end what you started.”

And it is then, finally, when he listens to his father’s words, to the happy shriek behind of him full of relief and love, that he realizes.  
His eyes are glassy as he turns around to his siblings, all staring at him now with smiles gracing their faces.

They are alive.  
He- _he_ is alive.

“Oh thank _God_ you’re awake!”  
Vanya exclaims and stands up to come several steps closer, but neither too close nor too fast. He wants to reach out to her with a thankful little smile, but it’s too much right now. They- they have actually made it.  
They have a genuine chance at pulling this off.

All of them seem to hover in the background, happy exclamations of course, until he steps forward into the light of the kitchen. It is still warm, but not as suffocating as before in his room.  
“Hey,” he mumbles with a crooked smile that still feels far too foreign on his lips but propels them into action. Allison pulls out the chair beside of her, begging him closer with a desperate, needy look in her eyes. He must have had them worried there for a while.

“Come here, let me check your fever.”  
Her voice is like silk, lulling him in until he sinks onto the wooden chair. A soft sigh escapes his lips, when he is off his feet. He is still dizzy, dark shadows are dancing at the edge of his vision but finally retreat the moment he gives his body some rest.  
The back of her hand carefully touches his skin and he closes his eyes relishing in the coldness seeping into his skin. “He is still burning up,” she mumbles into the direction of the others, then addressing him once more, “You shouldn’t even be out of bed yet, why are you down here?”  
The smile, so beautifully audible in her voice, like a chime, really, contradicts her words. She is elated to have him by her side and for once he doesn’t doubt it. They are happy to see him, even though their father is mere meters away and closely watching. Even though he threw them back in time all wrong, caught in a body their own but a time that couldn’t be more foreign for them like that. Even though he waltzed into their semi-alright lives and brought literal hell upon them.

“…’thought I was dead.”  
They all still, unnaturally so.  
Thanks to his closed eyes though he doesn’t notice and keeps talking, while a crooked smile slowly creeps onto his pale face.

“For the first time in forever I didn’t-“  
He breaks himself off. Old habits die hard. They shouldn’t know about it.

And still…  
He heaves a deep, shaky breath. Opens his eyes, stares at the table in front of him with a lost gaze.  
“It was peaceful,” he mumbles with his arms crossed in front of his chest protectively. But once he thinks back to that unreal moment, so far away and still so close to his heart, it doesn’t want to leave him. “I felt… It was… good. You know? No nightmare or a certain state of alertness you get used to, when- It just… I felt genuinely at peace. With myself.”

His last words are barely audible, more for his own confused self than anyone else’s. They only return to his thoughts, when Klaus has to bite the bullet and addresses his flinching form with a sad and unusually serious expression on his face. It sends a shiver down his spine even before his brother enlightens him.

“You were gone, Five. For a while there.”  
He doesn’t understand what Klaus really means right away.

“How long was I unconscious?”  
It doesn’t dawn on him, when Diego sucks in a harsh breath and tilts his head back to stare at the ceiling. It does neither when Vanya sits back down closer to him, a very, very confusing look on her face and a pacifying tone in her voice he isn’t used to.  
“For several weeks, nearly a month.” A pause, then she continues. At least she tries to. “But, Five, you – after you collapsed the moment we returned home…”  
She falls silent. Breaks their eye contact.

“You died.”  
He stops.

“You actually died, Five. What you did, bringing us into the past, all of us and so far- it really, _really_ messed you up. More than we realized at first. It is our fault really, but when Klaus told us he was able to see you-“ Diego wants to explain, still shut off with his arms wound tightly around himself to try and distance himself from past events, but his eyes, his voice more than anything, tell a different story.

He stops. Then chokes on the air stuck in his throat.  
_Oh God._

His eyes fling to Klaus in the middle of Diego’s explanation, who cuts his brother of rudely but necessarily. He realizes the second Five’s eyes, wide open and so, so afraid, land on him seeking his gaze.

Despite Five’s heavy flinch he surges forward and drops to his knees the second he is close enough to raise his arms and put his hands onto his clammy skin. “No, _nonono_ , listen! You – are not – dead.”  
A deep breath, Klaus’, not his, because he still can’t breathe nor look away from those piercing eyes, while he falls away, further and farther and faster. When Klaus continues, it is less desperate and more emphatic. “You are as alive as the others and I. No ghost, no projection of mine, understood?”

A shaky breath he releases.  
His shoulders sag unconsciously. Oh.

“Okay,” he mumbles, evades Klaus’ sharp gaze by closing his eyes and tries to shove those thoughts away quickly. It isn’t fast enough though to hide the flash of emotion crossing his eyes from his kneeling brother. Nor Ben, for that matter, who is faster than Klaus to exclaim an emotional “Oh fuck no, over my dead body!” before he can so much as open his mouth in a similar declaration.  
Luther’s “Really, Ben?” is drowned out by his own thoughts and Klaus’ tightening grip on his shoulders.

Because… _Oh_.  
For a moment there-

The thought is as foreign to him as it is to leave his family behind and give a fuck, but if it was not his own choice to make, a chain of events that ultimately leads to his demise… He would be alright with that. Even more than that.  
Giving up. Letting it all go. Live in that weird place in between, caught in endless sheets filled with eternal warmth and small glimpses and laughs to share with his siblings thanks to his gifted brother.  
It would… it would have been alright with him.

Regret.  
For a moment there he wishes he had died back then.  
Away from all the troubles always following him no matter how far he tries to run, finally at peace with his mind that is a nightmare in and of itself on good days.

“Hey.”  
Klaus’ voice is shaky when he finally gets through to him. Blearily he blinks up at him.  
“Not on my watch, little bro.”

He wants to argue with him out of habit for calling him something completely unreasonable, but for once the words don’t want to come to him. Klaus is not the only one to pick up on the change in behavior and what this little moment is really about.

“And that’s exactly why we shouldn’t have told him!”  
Diego’s voice echoes accusingly around the kitchen, but before anyone can raise to the bait to start an argument, muted steps shuffle closer. They fall silent once more, all abruptly tense but unable to utter a single word against his presence. Five can feel him standing behind of his chair, a silent presence but as steady and as unshakable as he remembers him to be. One of the rare good characteristics he associates with his father.

“You’re wrong,” he starts quietly and avoids Klaus’ desperate gaze, because it just hurts too much to see what they are all aware of. Five is not the only one to be succumbed to those kind of dark thought, because Klaus, oh their dear brother _Klaus_ …  
It makes looking him in the eyes so much harder, when his brother is aware of what exactly roams through his mind right now. He heaves a deep sigh, before he pushes the vulnerability away from himself, straightens and looks at their expectant gazes with a raised eyebrow.

“You think I would take the easy way out after literally moving heaven and hell to get back to you?”  
Admittedly that’s another accidental admission he really, really didn’t want them to know, but everything is still a little bit hazy around the edges and he catches himself more often than not on the verge of spilling things they shouldn’t know. Or, well, far over that edge.

And even though the tension perceptibly begins to ebb away, he slides forward on his seat ready to jump away. It is too much. Vanya’s hesitant smile blooming on her face, still so unsure of herself; Luther lingering in the background as if he doesn’t know what to do with himself, as if he thinks he doesn’t belong in their midst; Diego looking back and forth between the stairs and Five, always checking for when things might go sour, never appreciating a moment for what it is, instead always, always trying to prepare for the worst case scenario. It’s too much for his maltreated body and soul alike, so he clenches his fist and reaches for the familiar tingle behind his navel to bend space to his will, when a hand clasps his shoulder and doesn’t let go.

Surprised he looks over his shoulder and up into his father’s steady gaze solely fixed on him, even though he addresses his siblings.  
“You should take your brother back to his room, he still needs to rest.”

Before he turns back around towards the stairs, the grip on Five’s shoulder tightens for a short moment.  
“After all he apparently has a lot to stand up for.”

The barest hint of a smile graces his lips, then he turns back around to disappear in the darkness of the mansion. Five is still shell-shocked, when Klaus interrupts the silence with a sly grin that absolutely contradicts the seriousness from just mere moments before.  
“Yeah, I know, that’s a shocker to get used to, isn’t it?”

“Since when-“ he starts with a frown on his face, still in absolute disbelieve and pointing with a thumb back over his shoulder, before he is interrupted by Luther – of all people. The tension is blown away in an instant, gone the second they have a chance to tear another topic apart. Anything else than remaining on too emotional topics. It shouldn’t be like that, but it is. They are too used to it from a childhood that was anything else but.

And now…  
“We had a talk with him. After you- when you were unconscious.” His arms are crossed in front of his chest, while his eyes are far away. He looks just like Diego, Five muses with a tired smile that barely graces his lips. If only they knew how much alike they can be, when the motivation is just right.  
“W- Most of us are in our adult bodies, there is no possible way for him to manipulate us the way he did. So… We had a little chat with him.”  
It is nearly uncomfortable to hear those words out of Luther’s mouth, who praised their father to the skies for as long as Five can think. But there have been weeks in between after all, weeks in which they obviously have not idled away their time.

And maybe not only to his siblings’ improvement.  
Because in this household even the fracture of a smile from their old man feels like a heart-felt hug.

“It didn’t go the way we hoped it to, but he was surprisingly more insightful than we feared.”  
A short look he exchanges with Allison from the corner of his eyes, then Luther continues with a resolution he is far more familiar with. “But the rest can wait for another time. Let’s get you to bed.”  
He is fully prepared for an all-out discussion on why he should or shouldn’t stay up for a bit longer to roast his siblings on the past happenings, when a voice pipes up that sends a shiver down his spine. A second later Klaus has the back of his cool hand on his forehead checking his fever. He stays quiet, eyes on Ben.

“Please. I promise we’ll fill you in later. Just… rest. We- We were all worried sick.”

A moment of silence.  
Five blinks. Once. Twice.

It really is not an imagination, is it?

“Are you alive?” he asks quietly, while Klaus tenses beside of him. Ben takes the question much lighter, offers a vague gesture with his hand and a fitting “Hmm” as his only answer. Klaus only enlightens him so much, when he pulls his hand back to stand up again. “Major power up, remember?”

Not quiet, but he figures it is one of those things postponed to _‘later’_.  
When Ben arrives beside of him with a pointed stare in Klaus’ direction (“Don’t you _dare_ let me drop him”) and offers to carry Five since standing is a no-go at the moment, he guesses it’ll be alright. At least until he can pry every single word out of them with cunning wit like he is used to. Like they probably are as well, at this point.

“Are you ok?”  
And if the way he clings to Ben’s solid form in an unconscious search for any warmth as well as the way every one of his siblings automatically follows them up the stairs is anything to go by, it’ll be far from the last thing he will have to get used to.

“’ts not that bad, I guess.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeeaah, it's been two weeks, but I regret nothing.  
> 2 weeks for me is still a fairly good time, especially with a 4k words chapter and a hell of a month at work. Same old in that department.
> 
> So some of you requested a sick-fic with Five. Well... that's it? When I initially got the idea to continue the first chapter with a sick Five, I thought of him having a lil fever, coming into the kitchen and fluff ensues. Yeah. Uhm.... well. Does it still count?
> 
> Thank you all for your continuous support, it blows my mind away and fills me with joy to see so many of you hooked on what I fabricate!  
> As always, any ideas or prompts you have send them my way. In case you have any questions or want to maul me regarding a new chapter, you'll find me on Twitter: @milumaus
> 
> Love, Milu


End file.
